A Little Tenderness
by Laurie M
Summary: A short follow-up to 'Rules of Engagement', picks up where that story ends. Brenda and Flynn continue to move closer.


**DISCLAIMER:** I DO NOT OWN _THE CLOSER_ OR ANY OF THE CHARACTERS - I'M JUST PLAYING WITH THEM.

**AUTHOR NOTE: **My first fic for this fandom was a surprise hit. I hadn't intended to write anymore stories, but guess what...

This is a very short follow-up to _Rules of Engagement_ and contains a scene of non-graphic sexual situations. (I also suck majorly at love scenes so the one herein is not very good but mercifully brief.)

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_**A Little Tenderness**_

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_1._

Between work and her home they decide that dinner might be a good idea - or an idea, at least - and she surrenders the decision over their destination. Where he takes them is discreet and a little old-fashioned and it suits him, she thinks. And it suits her as well, when she looks at it, with its shadowed embrasures, worn red leather banquettes and framed photographs of old Los Angeles. For a while they behave with a strange formality, performing a ritual of deferring to one another, wearing a politeness that is at odds with their usual communications. It cannot last and it does not. Bit by bit the chinks appear, widen. And they talk to each other.

She watches as much as she listens: the way earnestness gives way to sudden laughter; how a smile changes his face; the fingers that steeple together when he makes a point. He talks about home as though it is somewhere else and when she asks he looks at her for a moment.

'Jersey.'

'Oh.' She sips her wine, observes him over the rim of the glass. 'I thought you were from L.A.'

Outrage and incredulity war across his face. 'Do I sound like I'm from Los Angeles?'

She shrugs. 'Y'all in the North sound the same to me.'

'Look, Miss Atlanta-'

Her eyes flash and he laughs, holding up his hands. 'Okay, okay. Truce?'

'That would be nice.' She takes more of the wine, savouring its flavour for a moment, sets the glass back down and props her cheek against her hand; the leather squeaks as she moves, settles. 'Do you miss it? Jersey?'

'I don't miss the winters - too cold. The summers can get pretty hot.'

'And L.A. ones don't?' She asks and one corner of his mouth turns up.

'One thing I do miss is the walking. No-one walks in L.A. Ever. If they do you think they're up to no good. In Jersey? Everyone walks, it doesn't matter who they are.'

'But you still have family there?'

He nods. 'Yeah, including four sisters - all younger.'

'You're kidding.'

His eyes crinkle. 'I wish. Lucy, Kathleen, Theresa, and Veronica. Two of them are married to cops; the other two aren't married at all.' One eyebrow rises. 'So at least two of them have sense.'

She smiles, a picture forming in her head. 'You're from a police family, then?'

He leans back in his chair. 'My dad was a cop, a beat cop, worked the same patch for nearly forty years. There wasn't anything that happened on those streets that he didn't know about; any problems people had, he'd be the one they'd go to. It wasn't always taken care of officially but it was always clean.' There is warmth in his voice and pride. She imagines an irascible yet kindly old-timer, boring all his former colleagues rigid with stories about his only son who is so far from home yet who has achieved so much more than he ever did; and she wonders if that's where Flynn's attachment to Provenza comes from.

'He must be proud of you,' she says softly.

'He was. I think he was.' Shadows for a moment, and then gone.

'My daddy hated me joining the police. He still hates it.' She drinks some of her wine, small sips. 'I think even now he'd prefer it if I gave it up and, oh I don't know, was a teacher or an accountant, even a lawyer. Or better yet, settle down and give him some more grandchildren to play with. I have three brothers,' she adds. 'I always wanted a sister when I was little.'

'You can have mine,' he tells her and she laughs.

'I grew out of it.' She's her father's daughter and likes being the only one. 'I still can't believe you have four.'

His head tilts. 'We were considered one of the smaller families; one of my aunts had ten kids.' Her eyes widen; he shrugs. 'That's Irish Catholics for you.' He pauses, then: 'Flynn - that's an Irish name, by the way. Just in case you thought I'm French or Cuban or something.'

'Yes, I knew that, thank-you.' She complains: 'Is this what I have to look forward to from now on?' The thought occurs to her that maybe he's just auditioning another sidekick for when Provenza isn't around anymore and glances over the issue of why she might suppose that they will last that long.

'Not if you don't want to.'

'I do. I think I do.' She lets out a breath. 'I wouldn't be here if I didn't.'

He starts to speak, stops, shakes his head. 'I'm not very good at this.'

She arches an eyebrow. 'Now that I don't believe. I didn't think you had any problem with women.'

He goes back to being thoughtful, a mood that he's always had but that she hasn't particularly recognised before.

'Women... That's different. You're a lady.'

She catches her breath again and takes the compliment for what it is. Where she comes from that is also an important distinction.

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_2._

Out in the open again and she suggests a walk. He looks at her, surprised, and she smiles up at him; it's such a strange, small gesture but it catches him off guard. He tries to remember the last time anyone did something that nice for him, or at least tried to; or maybe he just hasn't let anyone close enough for too long. Light from the street-lamp burnishes her hair, softens the contours of her features. It's been a long time since he's wanted any woman this much.

'A walk where?' He looks away from her for a moment, because if he can't see her then maybe he'll have a chance at holding it all together.

She follows his gaze, looking along the quiet street lined with cars and the sheet of newspaper being waltzed by the breeze along the sidewalk. No-one walks in L.A. - there is nowhere to walk to.

'Around the block?' she says in the end.

It's a challenge she has set herself and he knows she won't give up on the idea. They start to walk: close but not too close, just enough that he catches the scent of her hair.

He used to think that Los Angeles was a romantic place but that's another illusion he put away along with the others he used to have. But sometimes it's still possible to pretend. Terrible things happen in the darkness but it also makes everything beautiful. It's a city of dead sunlight but deep shadow and neon make it come alive, turn it back into the fairy-tale it probably never was but he likes to think that it might have been. Or could have been, once. The shadows hide the shabbiness of the their route and he's too distracted by her to notice anything else anyway. A lifetime spent in observing the minutiae of everything around him is suddenly focussed on her; and even that isn't enough to really see her. That would probably take another lifetime and she'd have to be willing to let him.

They walk slowly; she eases the weight of her bag on her shoulder and he pulls back at threads of their earlier conversation.

'Do you ever think about going back to Atlanta?'

'You mean permanently? Sometimes. I miss hearing the accent and I miss the pace of life-' She stops and shakes her head, laughing at herself. 'You know, that's what I always tell myself: that it's different back home, that everyone's nicer, but the truth is it isn't really any different there than it is anywhere else, it's just that it's where I come from.' She pauses again. 'Maybe that's why I don't go back all that much.'

It's always the places you miss the most that you stay away from, he thinks.

They complete the circuit, ending up at not quite the point they had started from and cross the street to his car. It's a quiet night in L.A. until somewhere in the distance a siren sounds on a rising chord and they both tense. It's a possible out if either of them wants to take it. He glances sideways; one of her hands has clenched on her knee, then relaxes. They drive.

At her house there is no escaping cat to greet them when Brenda slides the door open this time. He follows her in, closes the door, leans against it and watches her while she switches on lights and makes a fuss of Kitty when the feline deigns to show itself. He moves further into the room. She straightens up, looks around and looks a little embarrassed.

'I know, this place is a mess... I wasn't planning on company.' She moves a pile of papers and empty sweet-wrappers, not actually tidying anything but just shifting it all around a bit.

'It's no worse than mine,' he says, which is a lie but she looks relieved.

She clears her throat, fingers twisting together. 'Would you like- Oh. I don't think I have any ... cranberry juice, is it?'

'I'm fine.' He pauses, sees the line of tension in her shoulders. 'But if you want something, don't let me stop you.'

She tilts her head to one side, considering - not the offer, but him, like he's a puzzle she's trying to work out. 'I don't want anything. To drink,' she adds, a swift smile chasing across her face.

He moves one hand, raising it a little, drops it back, flexing the fingers. She stands and waits for him but it's as if now that the thing he's wanted so badly for so long is finally within his grasp he can't quite bring himself to take it.

So Brenda takes the two steps that separate them, puts her arms around his neck. His hands mark the lines of her back, catch at the ends of her hair. 'You are beautiful,' he says, sincere, and colour stains her face. He's used to covering his emotions in barbs and feels like he's on the brink. Familiarity is safer.

'And you do have really great legs.'

She laughs. 'Sweet-talker.' She can see through everyone; she can see through him; and he feels her smile against his lips.

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_3._

The first time is a relief from a hunger long buried. It is passionate and awkward, explorations followed by sudden retreats. Theirs is a negotiation made without words; a treaty signed in touch and taste and scent.

Afterwards, her head on his shoulder, her fingers follow the silver lines drawn against his skin. She knows, from a cursory look over his file after she accepted the transfer request, of the commendations and the injuries that led up to them. Knowledge is one thing but the reality of them is another; the healed wounds are more eloquent than any medal. He is a brave man and a good one. She presses her lips against the marks and his hands slide into her hair.

The second time, when she takes his weight against her, she shudders, anticipation knotting her stomach and her body rises to meet his. His hands are strong, roughened patches of skin catching against hers, claiming her. Her neck arches under his mouth and- _God, he's good at this_, she thinks. Less a thought than a feeling. Seconds chase each other, minutes flickering by in a chain of overloaded senses. It's like free-falling in a hurricane. She feels undone, pulled apart and put back together as someone new, someone carrying a piece of him with her. When the release comes it is deep, profound, and she hides her face in the curve of his neck so he can't see what he's done to her.

He makes her look at him, cups her chin in his hand and forces her gaze to his. And she sees it there in his face, behind his eyes; they have imprinted themselves on one another and the change is wonderful and terrifying.

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_4._

Her bedroom, now that he looks at it, is a symphony in red. Headache inducing. He can't stop staring at the chandelier; he remembers, vaguely, that the house had belonged to a murder victim, a dead Russian hooker. It doesn't look like Brenda has done anything to the décor since she moved in. Her hopelessness at life is strangely endearing.

Her body is pale gold against the garish sheets, no sign of the Los Angeles sun on it. Southern women still guard the whiteness of their skin; a porcelain doll with steel running through her. He strokes her hair, silk strands clinging to his fingers, and she stirs, eyes opening and watching him. She looks stripped and open and happy. When he's thought of her - and he has, many times, though never admitting it even to himself - nothing in his imaginings has lived up to these moments.

'I should go,' he tells her, reluctant.

She frowns. 'Why?'

'Because all my stuff is at my house and I also have to go to work tomorrow. And I don't think my boss would let me take any extra time off to go home and change. She's plenty tough.'

'Oh. She sounds horrible.'

He smiles, twisting her hair through his fingers. 'She takes some getting used to; but I can't think of anyone I'd rather work for.'

She catches his hand, holds it against her cheek. 'I'm sure she knows how lucky she is having you on her side.'

They made their peace a long time ago. In her work she is inflexible and it makes the generosity of her nature all the more surprising. She is vengeance and redemption in one, a golden goddess with a sweet-tooth. In the A.A. they teach you to give yourself over to a higher power; he decides to make her his.

'I should go,' he says again, his fingers memorising the curves of her face.

'Not yet. Don't go yet.'

He pulls her to him, her strength and sweetness melting in his arms. 'Okay. Just a while longer.'

She smiles and closes on her triumph.

_**FIN**_


End file.
